Monday May 9, 2011 4:18 pm

Kuma War 2 lets you recreate Osama bin Laden raid

Developer Kuma Games has released an update to its first-person-shooter Kuma War 2 that allows gamers to protect—or kill—Osama Bin Laden. And this isn't just some Unreal Tournament-style skin job: No, Kuma Games has faithfully recreated a map based on the assault on Bin Laden's Abbottabad, Pakistan compound.

The mission, "Osama 2011," comes as the 107th and likely final update to the company's free squad-based first-person shooter. When joining the game, Kuma War players are automatically assigned to one of two teams for the final Bin Laden mission: U.S. Navy SEALS, tasked with killing Bin Laden and recovering the body, or Bin Laden defenders, who have to save Bin Laden from harm by eliminating all opposing players.

"At Kuma, we are very sensitive and respectful of American and coalition soldiers and the sacrifices they are making every day," said Kuma Games CEO Keith Halper in an interview with Forbes. "We hope that by telling their stories with such a powerful medium that we enable the American public to gain a better appreciation of the conflicts and the dangers they face."

And before the PR nightmare for Kuma Games kicks into high gear, no, a player cannot control Bin Laden directly. Each instance of the mission features the role of the sought-after individual being played by the computer—perhaps a boon for those assigned to shoot him, as early videos of the mission don't indicate that the AI is particularly clever at avoiding harm's way.

So just how realistic is "Osama 2011?" Well, there's no single-player mode for the mission at least—which would pit you in an awkward one-on-one style battle against the entrenched foe. Players on the SEALS team do indeed start out from a helicopter landing and, assuming they were woken up in the middle of the night, Bin Laden defenders start the game without any guns at all.

Aside from killing Bin Laden, SEALS players also have to deal with the same downed Black Hawk helicopter that real special forces operatives faced during the May 2 raid. In the game, one of the final objectives that players have to undertake involves strapping explosives to the wreck and shooting them to blow up the helicopter itself—perhaps a bit more dramatic than the way it was actually performed in real life, but a faithful homage nevertheless.

However, those looking for a more tactical representation of the Abbottabad raid might want to look elsewhere, as Osama 2011 plays out more like a watered-down Call of Duty multiplayer game than an ARMA 2. Still, developer Kuma Games does take pride in the research it put into creating the mission, everything from the nighttime sounds of Bin Laden's final compound to the randomization of where the mastermind might appear within the level itself.

"We are sticking to our retelling of real-world events, and that means a lot of reading and research, as well as talking with sources so we can get it right," said Mike Thompson, project lead, in an interview with Kotaku. "It's not fun telling an artist to start a model over after an all-nighter because someone found a mysterious tail rotor, but that's what we do to get the job done."